Mchugh For The Defense Few Lawyers Will Work So Hard For So Little Pay. But The ``columbo`` Of Public Defenders Really Believes In Justice For All.

August 17, 1986|BY TIM ROSAFORTE

THIS IS GOING TO BE A two-pack day for Dennis McHugh, and his doctor has already warned him to cut down on smoking. McHugh has chronic bronchitis. He also has Judge Carney on a notorious attempted murder case, Judge Korda on the case of an alleged racketeer, and Judge Kaplan on a grand theft charge. For a man known as ``the Columbo of the Public Defender`s Office,`` it is just another morning at the Broward County Courthouse.

Three judges. Three crimes. Three defendants. Each case one hour apart, all of them swirling in McHugh`s brain along with megadoses of nicotine and caffeine.

And this is supposed to be the quiet time of year.

McHugh is what the Public Defender`s Office calls ``a floater.`` But he doesn`t float as much as he bounces between seven judges, leaving a trail of cigarette smoke and not-guilty verdicts in his wake. The tough-on-crime crowd might say that McHugh is responsible for coddling criminals. McHugh says he is responsible for defending the American way: His clients can`t afford their own lawyers, so eventually their cases end up in the P.D.`s Office on the seventh floor of the courthouse.

McHugh handles every type of crime except murder. His defense expertise extends to cases of cocaine trafficking, sexual battery, robbery, grand theft, initiating a riot and battery on a law enforcement officer.

This day is typical.

McHugh has been assigned the case of Michael Dwayne Seibert, an 18-year-old high school dropout charged with the near-fatal beating of British tourist Kathryn Jones on May 13 near the Intracoastal Waterway in Hollywood. Jones is now recovering in a London hospital while Seibert is being held without bond on charges of kidnapping and attempted murder.

McHugh wanted the case because it was ``interesting.`` But he was forced to ask Judge Robert Carney for a motion to withdraw; Seibert supposedly talked about the case while in jail, and one of the inmates who informed the State Attorney`s Office was a client of the Public Defender`s Office. This created a conflict, leaving McHugh no ethical choice but to bow out.

McHugh is now standing outside Judge Lawrence Korda`s office, puffing away under a no-smoking sign, still muttering about losing the Seibert case. Everywhere McHugh goes is a designated smoking area. It used to be Winstons. Now it`s Vantage 100 Extra Lights.

``My lungs,`` he says of his switch to the low-octane brand, ``just can`t take any more.``

THE LAST TIME McHugh saw Judge Korda was for sentencing in the Ruby Johnson case. During her trial, Johnson cussed out Korda, overturned the defense table, threw the court reporter`s notes into the air, and finally had to be put in handcuffs. Johnson, 32, was convicted in 1972 of stabbing a man to death in Miami. She was originally sentenced to 42 years in prison, but had since picked up an additional 19 years for aggravated assault and aggravated battery while doing time. McHugh was representing Johnson on a charge of assaulting a guard at the Broward Correctional Institute, regarded as the toughest women`s prison in the state.

``This is a very explosive woman who is angry at the world,`` Judge Korda says. ``Believe me, there isn`t anybody else in this county who would have defended her other than Dennis. But Dennis actually cared about her.``

When Johnson came back for sentencing, she wouldn`t talk. She wore a blank stare, cocked her head to one side, and swiveled back and forth in her chair, never looking Korda or McHugh in the eye. McHugh already had saved Johnson five years by appealing to Korda, but now she was looking at 10.

``You`re being your own worst enemy,`` Korda told the wiry, muscular defendant. She still wouldn`t listen. McHugh tried communicating with her, but she ignored him. All she had to do was talk, and Korda would not make her a habitual offender. This had drained McHugh. Ruby sat there like she didn`t care.

``I`ve got a feeling she doesn`t want to come out of prison,`` McHugh says later. ``She`s got a death wish.``

McHugh makes his rounds with the other judges on his calendar, then returns to the coffee room in the Public Defender`s Office to hold court. It is a room that blends secretaries and receptionists with fresh-faced law school interns and hardnosed lawyers. Sitting at the main table is an arrogant attorney in a gray suit and a tight-cropped haircut, which comes to a menacing point on his forehead. Crashed on a couch is a free-spirited lawyer wearing a ponytail, his snakeskin boots propped up on a chair in front of him. Helping himself to a soda is an attorney wearing horn-rimmed glasses, who explains the attraction to this smoke-filled gathering place.

``This is the only place in the courthouse,`` he says, ``where you can get cold soda, free coffee, newspapers . . . and Dennis.``

These men are all former public defenders now in private practice. Like McHugh, they just can`t keep away.